ctrl fn

Lenovo makes some pretty decent laptops and netbooks. But there’s one thing that always bugs me about Lenovo computers: the Fn and Ctrl key placement. Most computer makers put the Ctrl key on the bottom left corner of the keyboard, and place the Fn key just to its right. Lenovo inverts those two keys.

That means that if you’re used to another keyboard, you’ll often find yourself hitting Fn when you meant to hit Ctrl on a Lenovo keyboard, or vice versa. If you only use Lenovo PCs, it’s probably not a big deal. But if, like me, you spend a lot of time using a number of different computers from different vendors, this can be pretty frustrating.

Well, Lenovo is starting to recognize your pain, and the company plans to start offering ThinkPad users the ability to swap the Fn and Ctrl key functions in the BIOS. In other words, you’ll still be stuck with a keyboard that has the Ctrl and Fn keys in the “wrong” locations, but when you hit the Fn, it will act like Ctrl, and vice versa.

Unfortunately, it looks like the new BIOS option will only be available on future ThinkPad models. There don’t appear to be plans to make it available for existing notebooks or for Ideapad models such as the Lenovo IdeaPad S12 or Ideapad S10-2.

via Engadget

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8 replies on “Lenovo to let users swap Ctrl and Fn key functions”

  1. This is the worst thing about Lenovo machines. I wish they would admit their mistake and switch the keys already. Ctrl is useless if its not placed in its standard position.

  2. I hate this non-standard placement of common keys on lenovo keyboards. It is as bad as MACs

  3. It’s great news, I just wish they’d go one step further and actually switch the keys. I use lots of keyboards, and I don’t mind having to look at my keyboard for pgup/dwn, home, etc. but crtl? They need to match the desktop standard here. Use the bios setting for the few people who want fn on the outside. At least the ctrl key is a little larger than the fn.

  4. I have gotten used to my Fn, Ctrl, WinKey, Alt layout… it’s now come to the point I use WinKey on desktops in lieu of Ctrl and wonder why nothing happens.

  5. Considering how long Thinkpads are on the market, it can be almost said that other manufacturers are the ones that decided to do things backwards 😉

    And anyway, the overall quality of Thinkpad keyboard outweights any potential pains when coming to peace with Fn placement ;p

      1. Yeah…it’s just that Thinkpad keyboards are doing so many things better anyway.

        1. With “zima” as CEO we would still use typewriters from FACIT. They were on the market much further then Thinkpads.

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